The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
Miramax Films | Release Date: November 7, 2008 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
55
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 28 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
7
Negative:
5
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
And yet the great conundrum of the Holocaust is that it was perpetrated by human beings, not monsters. Few movies have rendered this puzzle so powerfully. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is not only about Germany during the war, although the story it tells is heartbreaking in more than one way. It is about a value system that survives like a virus. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Viewers should know that the film's resolution, though admirably restrained and unsentimental, is devastatingly sad. Parents should take this into account. This beautifully rendered family film is told in a classic and old-fashioned style, in the best sense, providing poignant and powerful teachable moments. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Even though it unfolds almost entirely through a child's eyes, and contains no onscreen violence, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas packs as devastating a punch as an adult-oriented drama about the subject. Its concluding five minutes are almost impossible to watch. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
The film has any number of chances to exploit the setting and Butterfield's wide-eyed innocence, but instead, it mines a vast, eerie tension by keeping both boys in the dark. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianMarc Mohan
Turns out this is a thoughtful, well-acted film that manages to view this most inconceivable of travesties through the eyes of child without being childish itself. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterRay Bennett
Boyne's tale is starkly cautionary, and writer-director Herman handles a difficult topic with great sensitivity, drawing splendid performances from his young actors with David Thewlis and Vera Farmiga and the other grown-ups reliably efficient. Read full review
80
VarietyDerek Elley
Opening half-hour has some of the best stuff in the movie, walking a precarious line between black irony and showing the war from a totally German viewpoint, without tipping over into gallows humor or parody. Read full review
80
Village VoiceChuck Wilson
In adapting Irishman John Boyne's acclaimed young-adult novel, writer-director Mark Herman (Little Voice) draws beautifully modulated performances from his two child actors, who navigate a full range of emotions from wonder to betrayal to guilt. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
In key ways, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is like Guillermo del Toro's "Pan's Labyrinth": a child, caught in the waking nightmare of one of history's ugliest times, confronting the horrors of a grown-up world, and dealing with them as best he, or she, can. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter Travers
The power of this Holocaust tale sneaks up and floors you. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Told from a different angle than any other Holocaust film I've seen. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The result isn't meant to be an historical document transmuted into fiction; instead, it's fiction turned into a fable, a dark fable. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
Because its gaze is so level and so unyielding, it stands as one of the better dramatic films made on this subject (although it's not nearly as fine as Louis Malle's "Au Revoir les Enfants." Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesSheri Linden
The film's two levels -- metaphoric and nitty-gritty -- don't mesh until the devastation of the closing sequence, which both indulges in and transcends melodrama. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas should be heartbreaking, but it isn't. The muted quality of its impact is the result of narrative shortcuts and a desire to keep the images from being too startling. Read full review
50
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
Herman's intentions are admirable, but his results are unsettling in the worst ways. Read full review
50
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The film succeeds to the degree that it does -- partially, but honorably and sometimes affectingly -- because it was made as well as it was. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle Smith
The bulk of the movie consists of scene after scene coyly setting up the same ironic juxtaposition, in the exact same way, about innocence vs. Nazism. Read full review
50
Washington PostJohn Anderson
Although it's a far less objectionable Holocaust revision than, say, Roberto Benigni's "Life Is Beautiful," Herman's The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is yet another attempt to revisit a sorrowful event in history that should never be forgotten or used for entertainment. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleJosh Rosenblatt
True artists will risk sacrificing audience goodwill for truth and sentimentality for cold historical reality, but Herman doesn't want your respect; he just wants your tears. Read full review
50
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
I found the movie impossibly basic and sanitized as a "never again" parable of the Final Solution - and simply wrongheaded as a story about children. Read full review
40
NPRBob Mondello
The faux-naive point of view probably worked better in the novel; the literalness of film renders certain of the story's conceits overly precious. Read full review
38
TV Guide MagazineNathan Southern
Herman fails to journey beyond the surface-level realities of his central perspective, which makes his film feel half-developed and poorly conceived, and drives it into sensationalism. Read full review
30
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Watching The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, it struck me that weaving a touching little tale about a death-camp friendship is actually a pretty bad way to teach kids about the Holocaust. Read full review
16
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
An appalling, jaw-dropping movie that will cause serious nightmares. Read full review
0
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
See the Holocaust trivialized, glossed over, kitsched up, commercially exploited and hijacked for a tragedy about a Nazi family. Better yet and in all sincerity: don't. Read full review
0
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
This might have had some potential as a German exercise in self-examination, but as a tony BBC Films production, with the actors all speaking British-accented English (including Jersey girl Farmiga), it reeks of self-righteousness. Read full review
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